Will the Phoenix Suns be the last ever super team in the NBA?

Will the Phoenix Suns be the last ever super team in the NBA?

Mike Greenberg though, longtime ESPN analyst and commentator, was on his show Get Up today and I think he was uh like delivering a little bit of a monologue and he was using as his reference point something we talked about yesterday. Seven different champions in seven straight years for the NBA. No matter who wins in the NBA, it’s going to be a a different champion, not a repeat. Seven straight years of a different champion every single year, which he was like, “This is great. This is awesome. He also declared it the end of the super team era in the NBA. Look what’s happened to recent efforts to construct super teams in Philadelphia, in Phoenix, in Brooklyn. None of them ever got out of the second round. None of them made the playoffs this year. Further, super teams tend to be old. The six oldest teams in the league this year were the Warriors, Celtics, Bucks, Suns, and Lakers. None of them are still in it. One of them didn’t even make the playin. So, what does all this mean? It means the NBA got their rules right. They created something called the second apron. I’m not going to bore you with the details. Simply put, its goal was to create parody and it worked. I remember speaking with a a GM and we talked about this. Um, and he told me what the Suns were trying to are trying to do doesn’t work now with the aprons. What? Five years ago? Yeah. 10 years ago? Sure. But what they’re trying to do now, it doesn’t work. It’s not going to work. It was, you know, one of the high-end executives in the league a year ago, I think, right? No, it was this year. Oh, was it at the beginning of last season? I think it was the trade deadline, right around the trade deadline or something. I thought it was earlier. And it was just like it just doesn’t, you know, that just doesn’t work now. Now, again, Giannis is going to get traded. He’s going to get traded somewhere where there’s another superstar. You want to call that a super team? Maybe. I think super team is really defined by to me a super team is three players taking up all your salary not two three players take three three players now taking up all your salary now you’re restricted you can only sign veteran minimum guys you can’t aggregate salaries you can’t do all of those things so if you have two superstars and then a bunch of other good players like you look at the Nuggets like you got Joic and Murray making all the money Gordon makes a lot of money. Um, Porter Jr. makes a lot of money. They’ve had a lot of restrictions with what they can do because that money’s tied up and they had to lose key players off their roster. Um, but I kind of like the way that they’ve done it. It’s it’s tough because you do you want to build a team with a lot of depth or do you want to build a team with more star players? Yeah. And do you want to to your point if if you’re the San Antonio Spurs and you’ve got a chance to go get Giannis? What? You’re going to tell me that you’re not going to do it because oh no, super teams don’t do it. No way. We’re not we’re not putting together, you know, it just it depends on the player and it depends on the situation. But I I think at the core of it, for the most part, it is over. And it is I I and I think more than anything, it’s not it’s not the lack of success of the Phoenix Suns or the Brooklyn Nets or the Philadelphia 76ers that’s going to dictate it being over. It’s going to be the second apron that’s going to be the undoing of it all. I mean, to your frozen move to the end of the draft. It’s just too punitive. It’s It’s just too hard to overcome. It’s just too restricting and it just it takes your margin for error and it reduces it to nothing. You’ve got to get everything else right. You’ve got to get every vet minimum guy right. You got to get every draft pick right. Now, for the Suns situation, it it sucks even more because they don’t have their draft picks and they’re not in control of their own destiny in terms of if they lose being able to reap the benefits of that. But I think more than anything, I I think teams will always want to acquire great players and team them with other great players. But I think the minute they start inching towards that second apron, they will run for the hills cuz that stuff just don’t work. It just doesn’t work. Minnesota got off cat, turned him into Devincenzo and Randall. Mhm. I don’t think Randall Randall makes a decent amount of money, but not and not what he made, not what Cat makes. That was one of those rare trades where it worked for the Knicks and it kind of worked for the Timberwolves. It did. It worked. It worked for everybody involved. It did. But but I I I think it now will the Suns I really highly doubt the Suns will go down in NBA history as the last ever super team. I I I have a hard time believing that. I I have a hard time believing that there won’t be another team who sees the Do we want the super teams or do we like the parody? Seven different champions in seven different years. This is cool. You like this better than a dynasty? I think this is cool. Okay, I’m going to tell you something. You’re not going to remember like if I said name the last seven champions, you might struggle. But if I said, “Do you remember the Warriors dynasty?” You’re going to say, “Yes.” Of course, we remember dynasties. The Celtics, the Lakers, the Bulls, the Spurs. We remember dynasties. easier to remember one team than it is seven. That’s all that is. You remember you remember their dominance. But but I mean I I remember, you know, I remember the Warriors. I remember the Nuggets. I remember the Raptors. I remember the Bucks. I mean, I remember most of the teams and what they did. And that doesn’t Just because it’s more Just because I remember it easier doesn’t mean it’s better, does it? I mean, just because the Raptors with Kawhi Leonard winning the one championship than Kawhi Boltz compared to the Warriors dynasty. But but the fact that it’s somebody different the next year and then it’s somebody different the year after that and somebody different after that it’s not it’s not that I’m celebrating the greatness of the Raptors. I’m celebrating the greatness of difference. I’m celebrating what you celebrate I’m celebrating that it’s not just the look the NBA in 2015 161 17 had a real problem. It was going to be the Cavs and it was going to be the Warriors and that was it and that was boring. You can say all you want about the greatness of your dynasties. It was boring. It was pre-scripted. It was pre-arranged. It was a It was a waste of time. The postseason was a waste of time. The regular season was a waste of time. We all knew what was going to happen. Lauren, you look very upset. No, I’m saying you could even pivot that argument to the NFL. Aren’t we all tired of seeing the Kansas City Chiefs in the Super Bowl? Totally. Totally. Aren’t we done with that? Yeah. And and I and I tell you, there are people who are looking at the NFL and saying they’ve kind of lost their touch with parody a little bit. You know, go look at the number of teams that repeat every year in the NFL. It feels like it’s growing and growing and growing every four years in a row. Cleveland Golden State and it was it got four years in a row was Cleveland Golden State in the finals. You you mean to tell me you weren’t bored of tears by that? I I Yes. I hated it. I hated it. But what I’m saying is there is something about the greatness of a dynasty Duncan Genobi and Parker Bird Male and Parish Magic Worthy and and Kareem that you just that is different than Giannis and the Bucks. It’s a Kawaii and the Raptors. It’s different. It’s a question of taste. I like it better this way. I like it a lot better this way. Yeah. A lot better. And I’m not saying that it’s not better. I’m just saying that there is something about the greatness of a dynasty that is everlasting. You’ll remember Mahomes and the Chiefs a lot more than you’ll remember, I don’t know, Nick Fos leading the Eagles to a Super Bowl. Yeah, but that’s not I’m not saying it’s better. I’m not trying to say it’s better. I’m just I’m saying that the dynasties are what you remember more. You remember the dynasties more because of the overall length of greatness. To your point, do we want the Phoenix Suns to be the last ever they’re not going to be, but do we want them to be the last ever super team? I mean, that’s a weird question because I I there’s part of me that would like to think that that I don’t know that they got it so wrong that that everyone’s like, “Oh, we don’t want to be You know, like like they like they were the example of when you do it the wrong way, it can be so bad that you wouldn’t want anybody to follow in their footsteps. I don’t know. I don’t I don’t know if I’d want the Suns failure to be the lasting image of super teams in the history of the NBA. I don’t know if I want my team to bear that burden of, hey, your team did it so bad they did away with super teams because your super team was so bad. I don’t know if I want my team to Brooklyn bear that burden. The Suns right now, the Suns are the L because the Suns failed so miserably at it though. It’s different. But they won’t be they won’t be the last one. They won’t be the last one. Thanks for watching Burns and Gambo. Click to see more from the guys and hit the button in the middle to subscribe so you never miss a video from Arizona Sports.

Burns & Gambo debate if the failure of the Phoenix Suns attempt to create a super team around Kevin Durant, Devin Booker and Bradley Beal will deter other teams from creating their own in the future.

Pacers’ rise in NBA postseason a reminder of Suns’ past failures: https://arizonasports.com/dan-bickley/suns-pacers-haliburton/3584598/

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